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WASHINGTON: At age 12, half of American kids hold informal jobs like baby-sitting or yard work, and by age 15, nearly two-thirds are employed, according to a new Labor Department report. "The American work ethic starts at an early age," said Labor Secretary Alexis Herman of the findings about young Americans' working habits, released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday. The study found that a smaller percentage of the teen-age population held jobs in the late 1990s than two decades earlier, in the late 1970s, however. During the period from 1977 to 1979, an average 30 percent of 15- to 17-year-olds held jobs during the school year and 43 percent did in the summer. By comparison, from 1996 to 1998, an average of 25 percent in the same age group held jobs during the school year and 34 percent in the summer. The BLS study combined findings from annual government surveys of American households with in-depth interviews conducted in 1997 with 9,022 young men and women who were between the ages of 12 and 16 on Dec. 31, 1996. Findings were focused on kids 15 and younger. The 1997 interviews revealed that about 50 percent of kids had worked in informal jobs at age 12. By age 14, the share of kids working rose to 57 percent. About 43 percent of 14-year-olds were still doing only odd jobs like neighbors' yardwork or babysitting, while 24 percent had formal, ongoing employment and some did both kinds of work.

Bibliography Citation

Love, Alice Ann. "Most American Kids Start Work by Age 15." The Canton (Ohio) Repository, July 8, 2000: Money.